God Asked, We Obeyed, and the Blessings

I thought I would give an update about the Canned Food Drive as well as some reflections on the whole experience now that it is finally done.

Saturday morning we woke up to find at least 4 inches of snow on the ground. Maybe not the best weather for the food collection but at least it was not raining. When we got to the school the only kids that showed up were the two Ludu girls (Alexandra and Loridana) with their little sister Bianca. They go to church with us. Dragoste ( one of the Romanian leaders) also came with us. After meeting with the Veritas staff it had been determined that we only needed packages for 75 families rather than 100. That meant on Saturday we set our goal for at least 27 food items. We had already received a large cash donation from a store owner who also hung up signs in her store. We collected until 1pm and met our goal for the day. With more people resources we would have been able to collect more as there were still at least 300 apartments we weren't able to get to.

The day had it's fair share of downs and ups and I want to share those with you. Early on in the day the Ludu girls with Mel got yelled at by a not very nice women and the women's neighbor. They were called all kinds of names like beggar and gypsy and they just felt miserable and lost almost all courage to continue. It is to be expected that things like this will happen. Some people in this world are just really unhappy people. Knowing that though doesn't make it any easier when you experience these unhappy people. I give a lot of credit to those girls though. They stuck it out and kept collecting. I kept praying after that for them to have a really good experience somewhere that would ease the hurt. It came towards the end for them and it really was a blessing. The girls knocked on the door and when the elderly couple answered the door they were so excited and said "They came, they came". The couple had two large bags of flour just waiting for us. The couple was so sweet and wonderful to the girls.

I had a blessing of a different sort that day. I knocked on one door. A man answered and we gave him the paper explaining what we were doing. I think he told us to wait although I am not sure so when he closed the door I waited. Eventually the door opened again and an elderly woman was there who was about to leave. She came out in the hallway and seeing as I was still waiting for them to send me away or give me something I thought I would help the women to the stairs. That led to helping her go up the one flight of stairs to her apartment. When we got up there she asked me to come it. I decided to be more like Romanians and take her up on the offer- the collecting would just have to wait. I talked with her a little bit and understood enough to realize that she rarely ever leaves the apartment. I asked her if we could come sing Christmas carols for her on Monday night. She thought that would be wonderful although she said she had nothing to give us if we came caroling. Not to worry I said- we would bring oranges. When I finally left, the woman from the apartment on the floor below came out with a bag of sugar. I will tell how the Monday night went later on.

After the food drive we took the girls out for pizza at a restaurant. That was a real treat for them (as it would be for many Romanians). I am not sure if they had ever been in a restaurant before. For a Romanian- restaurants are very expensive. I sat there and thought about the contrast. Nolan and Liam have been in so many restaurants that they take it for granted and here these three girls are sitting having pizza and bottles of sprite and it is a real treat. Americans really don't realize how other parts of the world live or what we take for granted.

Tuesday night we took the money that had been raised (240 Ron) and went and purchased 62 bottles of oil, 57 bags of sugar, and 52 bags of flour. Alexandra and Dragoste went with us. This was also quite a new experience for them. Dragoste said he felt like Mos Nicolai (St Nicolas). The cost of cooking oil, flour, and sugar has really gone up in price since the summer. I just looked our receipts from the summer and the same bottle of oil in July cost 2.59 and when we bought it the cost was up to 4.59. Flour and sugar have each gone up about .50. That may not seem like much but when a good wage is around 2.5 an hour, it is a lot. Cooking oil is used a lot in Romanian diets so it is particularly painful for the price of oil to be going up so much. We matched what the Romanians donated using ministry money in our budget. So each one of you that contributes financially know that this month you helped provide oil, sugar, and flour to families who will really appreciate getting it.

Maurice and I packed the bags this morning and then got two unexpected surprises when we went to check on the details of distributing the food items this evening. The first was that we had just asked that the story be put in the local newspaper. Turns out that the thanks to our friend Petra it will also be on the radio and television. This is really important that the kids and those that contributed can see the results of their efforts. The other surprise was that the Hochland cheese company wanted to be a sponsor and donated one cheese wheel for each packet

Tonight was the night that Veritas held a dinner for the families that would be recipients of the the food packages. It was really a beautiful evening and after dinner we were asked to come up and talk about the food packages. All of us that had collected came up and I talked to them about what we had done and explained that these packages weren't from Veritas or from the church. These packages came from their neighbors and people in the community. That is what really made this special. Dragoste and Alexandra both talked about how they had prayed for courage and found it and how much this has changed them. Andreia (she works with the teens from the Family Center) asked if she could share a few words. She shared how much it meant not only that people collected food but that people were wiling to give. She said that this would change the way they look at things and believing in things that might seem impossible. Then one of the men stood up and thanked us and told us how special what we did was. The really touching part was that they all stood up and sang the traditional song that it sung at all celebrations in Romania. It made me cry and I am pretty sure Maurice was tearing up.

Here are some reflections on the whole experience:
1. We will never understand as Americans what this means to Romanians who spent more than 50 years under a communist regime and see very little hope, even now that communism is gone, for a better life. It is hard to describe but you get the sense that no one believed it was possible and were more than pleasantly surprised when it did. They may actually begin to find hope in their community again.

2. As Americans we take most things for granted. We contributed the equivalent of $120 to complete the food packages. To Romanians that feels more like $1200. Even more amazing is that is what Romanians themselves contributed. We probably also find it hard to imagine what the big deal is with a bag of sugar, a bottle of oil, and a small sack of flour. For many that may be as much as a day's wages.

3. I am not sure what God's plan was in all of this and it would be easy to get discouraged that no other kids showed up on Saturday to collect food. Instead I like to focus on the positive things where I can see God really working. To see the courage that God gave the Romanians who did this is amazing. To see that if we just answer his call he will provide.

4. From my devotional:

II Kings 3: 17-18
"You will see neither wind nor rain, yet this valley will be filled with water, and you, your cattle and animals will drink. This is an easy thing in the eyes of the Lord.." To human reason, what God was promising seemed simply impossible, but nothing is too difficult for him. It is the role of faith not to question but to simply obey. In the story above from the scriptures, the people were asked to "make this valley full of ditches" (II Kings 3:16). The people obeyed, and then water came pouring in from some supernatural source to fill them. What a lesson for our faith! (Excerpt from Streams in the Desert by LB Cowman)

5. Lastly- I promised I would share about the woman we went to sing with. She loved it and it was really a blessing for me to be a part of that. Her story is sad. She is a 79 year old women who lost her husband and one son 3 years ago. She lost her daughter at the age of 7 when she fell off the back of a wagon and she doesn't speak with her other son due to some conflict. She has a pace maker and lives on the 4th floor of an apartment building. She almost never leaves the apartment building as there is not an elevator. In fact in all of Sighisoara there is only one apartment building with an elevator. During communist times only buildings with more than 5 floors needed an elevator. Thus most buildings were only built with 5 floors. As an American who grew up with the Americans with Disabilities Act it is incomprehensible the difficulty faced by the elderly and people with special needs in this country. As Americans we take it for granted that there are always elevators, escalators, handicap ramps, and handicap parking. You won't find much of that here. So next time you ride one- be thankful and remember the people who are not as fortunate.

6. Thanks so much to everyone who supports us with prayer. Those prayers have been invaluable.

-Karen